The object of the invention is a transfer disc for the transferring of rod-like articles of tobacco industry and its use to tobacco industry's rod-like articles containing elements which are not connected or are loosely connected with the article.
The object of the invention may be used in the tobacco industry, in particular with regard to the transport of rod-like articles, in particular of rod-like articles containing elements which are not connected or are loosely connected with an article e.g. granules, loose fillers, aromatic elements and marking elements.
In the tobacco industry, the rod-like articles, both semi-finished and finished products, for example filter rods, cigarettes, etc., are transferred individually or in a mass flow. Individual rod-like articles are transferred directly one after another or at intervals, whereas the transfer is frequently accompanied by a change of direction of articles' movement. The purpose of this invention is in particular to transfer rod-like articles from a feeding device to a receiving device, whereas the rod-like articles being fed have a zero speed in the direction of their axis.
Transfer discs for the transferring of tobacco industry's rod-like articles are known in the prior art, in particular the U.S. Pat. No. 8,475,348 document shows a typical use of a transfer disc for the change of direction in which a tobacco industry's rod-like article is transported. In the solution according to the U.S. Pat. No. 8,475,348 patent a rod-like article is in a rectilinear movement when it gets into the area of action of a first principally horizontally situated transfer disc which changes its direction of movement by 90 degrees. Subsequently, the rod-like article is transferred to a second transfer disc which changes the direction of transport of the rod-like article by 90 degrees by directing the article downwards in a plane which is perpendicular to the plane in which the rod-like article moved before. In this solution, the rod-like article maintains the linear speed of movement along the longitudinal axis, only the direction of this speed is changed, while no accelerations in the axial direction of the article occur.
According to the solution known in the prior art and disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 8,118,721, a rod-like article is accelerated by a transfer wheel from the zero speed in the direction of the longitudinal axis to the transport speed. In this solution, the rod-like articles are transversely brought into the area of action of the transfer disc i.e. are moved perpendicular to the longitudinal axis. In the area of action of the transfer disc the articles are transferred by a lug of the transfer disc and accelerated to a suitable speed required in the transport system.
Solutions known from the prior art work relatively well in case of rod-like articles with a homogeneous structure or compound rod-like articles whose elements are closely connected with one another. Due to the change of direction of movement of transferred articles, usually used lugs or pushers hit the articles being transferred point-wise causing an impact, which results in the front surfaces of the articles being damaged. In case of rod-like articles containing elements which are not connected or loosely connected with the article there is a problem of negative consequences of such impact e.g. the granules, fillers, tobacco, loose materials spill out, or the marking elements such as marking fibres or aromatic elements such as threads containing aromatic substances slip out.
Moreover, a hit in the bottom edge of a rod-like article causes an unfavourable change of position of the rod-like article as a result of which its front face is unfavourably lifted, and in an extreme case it may result in the rod-like article being turned or thrown out of the transport path.